Carmelo Anthony never won a championship or even reached the NBA Finals during his 19 seasons in the NBA, but the popular former Knicks forward deservedly will reach the personal pinnacle of the sport when he is enshrined Saturday into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame.
The 10-time All-Star and the 10th all-time leading scorer in NBA history — who played in New York from 2011-17 — was voted in on his first try after amassing 28,289 points for a career average of 22.5 per game, including a league-best 28.7 ppg for the 2012-13 Knicks.
That team won 54 regular-season games and advanced to the second round of the playoffs for the only time over a dreadful 22-season stretch that lasted from 2000-2022.
“I’ve talked to a lot of people over the past week and over time since the nomination, and everybody has something different to say,” Anthony told reporters Friday at Mohegan Sun in Uncasville, Conn., ahead of Saturday’s induction ceremony in Springfield, Mass. “Everybody’s emotions are different, everybody’s journey is different and everybody processes it in a different way.
“But the one thing that’s consistent is the fact that we’re all here and — I know for myself — the fact that we get an opportunity to be kind of brought in by the basketball gods. When you talk about who’s in the Hall of Fame and bringing you into the Hall of Fame, to me, you can’t put that in words. … For me, I just want to enjoy it and take it all in and be in the moment.”
Anthony won an NCAA championship as a freshman during his lone collegiate season playing for Jim Boeheim at Syracuse, and he earned three Olympic gold medals as a key member of Team USA in 2008, 2012 and 2016.
Only Kevin Durant (four) has won more Olympic golds among American male basketball players, and Anthony actually will be inducted twice Saturday, also along with the 2008 “Redeem Team.”
Anthony, 41, was the No. 3 pick in the 2003 NBA Draft by the Nuggets, two spots behind NBA all-time scoring leader LeBron James — who is entering his 23rd season in the league.
Anthony, who was born in Brooklyn, was brought back to New York in a Feb. 2011 blockbuster trade that sent Danilo Gallinari, Wilson Chandler, Raymond Felton, Timofey Mozgov and multiple draft picks (including the right to swap their 2016 first-rounder, which became Jamal Murray) and cash to the Nuggets.
No. 7 still garners a raucous reception every time he is announced to the home crowd on the scoreboard at Madison Square Garden.
“Wanting to be in New York and wanting to accept and take on that challenge, I understood the assignment, and I understood what I was up against,” said Anthony, who set the Knicks’ franchise record with 62 points in one game in 2014. “I understood the people, as far as how they hold you, how they look at you and how they receive you.
“Win, lose or draw … we’re talking about the Mecca of basketball. Our city, so nice they named it twice. So for me to come and represent that, and do it with such grace and such respect and take whatever comes with that, I was willing to do that.”
Anthony’s 18-year-old son, Kiyan, who is starting his freshman year at Syracuse, posted a heartfelt message Friday on The Players’ Tribune.
“Yo Pops, you’ve been a Hall of Famer to me my whole life,” Kiyan wrote. “All of that hard work, every day grinding, nobody seeing you work as hard as you do, everybody taking you for granted.
“It doesn’t go unnoticed. I’ve seen everything.”
The elder Anthony also appeared on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” earlier this week. Carmelo referred to James as “my brother,” but teased that it’s time to “hopefully get his a– up out of there and come on over [to] this side. Enough is enough. Give it a break.”
Other inductees in the Class of 2025 will include eight-time All-Star center Dwight Howard, WNBA and UConn legend Sue Bird, who hails from Syosset and attended Christ the King, fellow Huskies great Maya Moore and longtime college and NBA and college coach Billy Donovan. A Long Island native, Donovan was the point guard for Rick Pitino’s Providence squad that reached the Final Four in 1987.